Tuesday, May 13, 2008

"Hands up who's bought a new HDD for their 360. Anyone? Anyone? No, didn't think so. $180 for a 120GB hard drive isn't pricey, it's taking the piss. So just why, exactly, do they cost so much money? MTV's Patrick Klepek contacted tech analysts iSuppli (who you may know from their console breakdowns) to find out.

As you can probably surmise, they found much of the cost is taken up by the needless packaging and design required by Microsoft in order to ensure the drive works only in your 360 console. Some the biggest contributors to its inflated price (ie prices beyond the HDD itself) include:

- The HDD ships not only with pre-installed software (demos and/or XBLA games), but part of the console's OS itself. This = increased costs.

- The HDD must be coloured and shaped to fit inside the specially-designed housing that ensures only your 360 can use the unit. That's more extra expenditure. This is done by a "Value Added Reseller", who also take care of the HDD's retail packaging.

- Microsoft have at this point paid an estimated $100 (iSuppli can only go estimates, though as specialists in this stuff their numbers won't be far off), and then split the remaining $80 profit with retailers and distributors (a 120GB HDD retails for $180).

Now you know why they're overpriced, feel free to keep on avoiding them."

Kotaku put together a good article here (but what Kotaku article isnt awesome) and while I do fine with my 20 gig HDD I see why the big one is freaking overpriced.